No. 4 Women's Rowing Places Fourth at NCAA Rowing Championships; A4 Collects Silver

Sunday, June 2

Bethel, Ohio

Princeton University

NCAA Championships

Photo by: © row2k Media

No. 4 Women's Rowing Places Fourth at NCAA Rowing Championships; A4 Collects Silver

June 02, 2024 | Women's Rowing - Open

The question — how would you describe your Princeton rowing experience — took Hailey Mead by surprise.

"That's a tough one," she said in the moments after it ended. "I'm not sure I can come up with just a sentence right now."

In truth, it may take her weeks or even years to fully answer the question. In the present moment, there were the competing emotions of knowing that her time at Princeton had officially ended and knowing that it ended in a manner that brought a single word from her head coach, Lori Dauphiny: "Yay."

Mead was part of the Princeton Varsity 4 boat that finished second at the NCAA Championships on Harsha Lake in Bethel, Ohio, Sunday morning. For Princeton, it was the second time ever that the V4 boat medaled, and the common denominator was Mead, who was also in the boat two years ago when the Tigers took gold.

"It feels really amazing," she said. "The first time was indescribable. We weren't expecting it at all, and it set a new expectation for us. This time was just amazing."

The V4 was one of three Princeton boats who had advanced to the A Finals for Sunday. The Second Varsity 8 raced second, finishing sixth but gaining extraordinarily valuable team points, and the First Varsity 8 then finished fourth in the final event of the weekend.

Added together, Princeton finished fourth in the team standings, marking the first time Princeton has been in the top four in three consecutive seasons since 2010-13. Texas edged Stanford for the national championship, finishing with 130 points to 127 for the Cardinal. Tennessee was next with 118, followed by Princeton, again the highest finishing Ivy League team, with 112.

Mead was joined in 4V boat by Laoise O'Donhoue, Alice Patton and Emma Cavendish, with coxswain Francie McKenzie. The Tigers were pretty much in the middle of the pack through 1,000 meters before turning it on from there, finishing second to Texas but finishing nearly a second ahead of Stanford.

The 2V had a big finish in Saturday's semifinal just to get into the A Final, where the team gave the Tigers 34 points. The 1V final was then going to decide not only who won the title between Texas and Stanford but who would get third between Princeton and Tennessee.

As it turned out, Texas never trailed and won by nearly two seconds over Stanford. Tennessee hung with Stanford before finishing third, and Princeton came in a strong fourth.

"It was a really good weekend," said Mead, who was active in film production during her time at Princeton and who will possibly be pursuing that as her career. "We put together a lot of solid racing. I'm so proud of everyone, in my boat and on the whole team."

"I'm so proud of this team," said head coach Lori Dauphiny. "Placing 4th in the country as a team is very strong. The V4 crushed it with a very impressive performance to win the silver. The 1V8 put it all on the line with a courageous effort. The 2V8 fought hard to get into the grand final and gave it their best. We also recognize the role that the whole team had in making this possible. It was great to qualify all three boats to the grand finals as well. We were the only Ivy school to do so. We had an amazing season!"